Chapter 14

“What are you talking about?”

“Uh, uh…?”

“You’re still someone I can rely on.”

014

Reestablishment (Part 2)

Childhood friends aren’t really that special of a relationship.

In the countryside where I grew up, it was like that. There weren’t many kids, and as we grew up, no one left the village or new people came in.

From the moment we were born, we saw the same faces and stayed together for life. Not just the two of us, but everyone in the village.

But if you look beyond just being “childhood friends” and see it as a relationship between you and me,

we were the most special people in the world to each other.

I grew up neglected, with my mother gone and my father busy with work,

and Anne knew her parents were important people but was raised by strangers she’d never met.

In the midst of poor but harmonious families, we were like impurities, out of place, and it was only natural that we were drawn to each other.

But before we moved to the city, when you still had a cough and I was more “romantic” than realistic,

we used to joke around, half-seriously, saying things like:

“Maybe all of this is fate?”

Even if it wasn’t a small countryside village, even if we had met as a shabby merchant and a high-ranking member of the Religious Order, we would’ve fallen in love at first sight.

Even if it was just the kind of naive, immature talk you’d expect from teenagers.

The same voice, the same words. The past and present overlapped, and when I closed and opened my eyes, I saw a completely different world.

“Yeah, definitely. It was Ailim’s guidance that brought us back together.”

In this world of light that felt so uncomfortable, you, who had grown so much, were repeating the same words as before.

Everything had changed. Fate had become Ailim’s guidance, the fragile girl had become an Inquisition Judge, and I…

I don’t know. What have I become? A heretic, as they say? Even Anne sees me as someone who needs to be saved from the darkness.

Even if it’s for some absurd reason like me changing my heart.

“Is that so?”

I didn’t even have the energy to argue anymore, so I just weakly responded.

The truth is,

my feelings for you had grown so much that I thought I’d never be able to love anyone else again.

I don’t even remember why I accepted the engagement. Even now, when you’ve become someone I can’t hate, the days I spent longing for you are still vivid.

“Yeah. Louis, you know this, right? Evil is judged—”

“—and good is rewarded. How could I not know?”

The faith I casually believed in. Everyone in the village, everyone in the world, served Ailim, so naturally, I too prayed to the world’s only god.

I wasn’t devout, but I never doubted its existence. But now, in some sense closer to god than ever, I was doubting for the first time.

If everything truly is according to your will, what is the meaning of this trial I’m facing? If you are omniscient and omnipotent, why do you test your children when you already know?

But even as ignorant as I am about religion, I know this kind of questioning is blasphemous.

“Yeah, that’s right!”

And I also know I should never say this to the girl smiling brightly in front of me.

“I’m so happy that the light is slowly returning to you. Louis, I can’t say for sure right now, but once the darkness inside you is washed away—”

Anne was clearly speaking with excessive goodwill, but the girl I knew wasn’t the type to scheme or plan like this.

The condition she set somehow sounded sinister.

If you fall in love with me again.

“You’ll be able to go outside again. There’s no reason to keep someone who’s no longer a heretic locked up.”

“Really…?”

“Of course. The reformatory is a place to rehabilitate heretics who have the potential to return to the fold.”

Anne said that, and the name of this place undoubtedly reflected that, but…

For some reason, the words of the man I first met here, whose name I don’t even know, felt more trustworthy. This place felt too rigid for such soft reasoning.

Even though my wounds have healed now, the scars left by the fire marks on my body might be why I feel this way.

Not everyone in the Religious Order is this kind, and most are actually hostile to me… No, wait. I laughed bitterly at the thought I’d just conjured.

“Ha, haha.”

“What’s wrong, Louis?”

Anne wasn’t always kind either, was she?

I remember her expressionless face hidden under a helmet, wielding a mace and slaughtering, yet her silver armor remained spotless. The ruthless Inquisition Judge.

‘Take him away.’

The cold voice that echoed in my mind as the world closed in still rings in my ears.

“I’m happy.”

“Huh…?”

“I thought I’d never see the sunlight again. Honestly.”

I can’t tell you what I really want to say. If you changed after hearing it, if you became like the other Inquisition Judges, I might really break down.

So I aimed and shot the second thing I wanted to say.

“I was scared of you.”

That was also the truth.

When you witness overwhelming power like a disaster, it’s natural to feel intimidated, even if there’s no intent behind it. What if that “power” had clear intent and direction? What if it was directed at harming you?

Anne might have thought her actions were to protect me, but to me, they were nothing short of a disaster. Even if it was someone else who tortured me.

In the end, it was you who locked me up here. You’re the root of all this.

“Me… scary?”

Hearing my words, Anne stuttered like a broken doll.

As if she didn’t know her storm-like actions would be seen as terrifying, or as if she didn’t expect me—of all people—to say such a thing.

Her reaction was more intense than I expected, and I had no choice but to hold back my words. To make sure her patience didn’t reach its limit.

Anne took my silence as agreement and fell silent herself. Her face, frozen like ice, flickered with emotions I couldn’t read.

Then, with a sound like ice cracking, the girl who was too kind to be cold spoke again.

“Why? Because I destroyed the village? Or because I kidnapped you?”

You knew.

You knew all along…

“Louis.”

When Anne called my name, I flinched without realizing it. Not out of fear, but for another reason.

All my thoughts cleared. Her tone was completely different from before. The unfamiliar sides of Anne I’d seen since we reunited. Not cold, not mad, not gently embracing or mature.

Even after all the time apart, she was still the Anne I “knew.”

“It’s been almost ten years since we last met…”

A whining, sulking, childish voice.

That was the Anne I knew. Even though you were two years older than me, I often played the role of an older brother when we were together.

Why was that? Because you were frail and slow to develop, looking younger than your age? Because you cried easily and held onto even the smallest things all day?

“I was hoping for a fairy-tale reunion, you know. Louis, you forgot about me and greeted me like this.”

With a choking sensation, I barely managed to retort.

“I didn’t forget.”

“I, I…! I did everything to protect you!”

But Anne didn’t even acknowledge my words. That was rare too.

Her voice gradually rose. The cold world’s icy winds had frozen her heart, but the faint warmth inside still struggled to break free.

“I got blood on my hands, endured everyone’s whispers. If just one person, just one, didn’t look at me like that, I could’ve endured anything…”

But the Anne I knew, the girl like a flower in a glass garden, was someone who couldn’t even get angry properly. Her rising voice eventually fizzled out, leaving only a sigh-like breath.

I used to drop everything and run to hug Anne when she was like this. I’d hold her lightly, pat her shoulders until the trembling stopped.

When you shook your head, saying you didn’t want to show your ugly face, I’d gently comfort you, saying there was nothing ugly about you. When you finally looked up, I’d struggle to hold back my laughter—a long-standing, pleasant secret of mine.

“After all this effort… why don’t you understand?”

But ten years have passed.

The fourteen-year-old me and the sixteen-year-old you, now twenty-five and twenty-six, couldn’t be the same.

“Ugh, sniff…”

Even though you’re crying within arm’s reach, I don’t hug you.

You, crying alone, have learned to stop your tears without anyone to comfort you.

Now, you don’t hesitate to show your tear-streaked face. Even though your face is still flushed, the eyes that were shedding tears moments ago have turned as cold as ice.

Trying to glare at me but faltering, Anne lashed out.

“You’re really mean.”

Even though I abandoned you, in the end, you couldn’t be cruel to me.

What came out of your mouth wasn’t even a proper insult.

I felt strange. I’m not denying my fault, but if we’re weighing the scales, yours is undoubtedly heavier. You’ve become an adult who can be cruel to others, but to me, you still show the childlike side of you.

For some reason, hearing those words made me feel like I’d committed some great wrong against you.